Friday, May 27, 2016

Memorial Day Weekend 2016

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."  Remembering those who made the ultimate sacrifice.

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Wednesday Hodgepodge January 27, 2016

Also known as the Hodgepodge after the Snowpocalypse.



1. Share a winter memory from your childhood. 
My most vivid memories involve sitting in the house listening for the school closing notice on the radio.  Although my father taught in the same district, the radio often told us that school was closed before the phone tree reached him (old technology....).  Once closing was announced, I remember discussions with my brother about where to sled.  Good thing our parents didn't know about some of the places we went.  As a parent and grandparent myself I can't believe we went down some of those hills! I still have my old Flexible Flyer!
 2. What was on your blog this time last year? (Besides the Hodgepodge of course!) If you weren't blogging, what in the world were you doing with all that free time? 

I didn't have this blog this time last year. What was I doing?  Reading y'all's blogs, of course!

3. Ellen Goodman is quoted as saying, 'We spend January 1 walking through our lives, room by room, drawing up a list of work to be done, cracks to be patched. Maybe this year, to balance the list, we ought to walk through the rooms of our lives...not looking for flaws, but for potential.' 

Do you see more flaws or more potential in your life at the start of a new year? Have you done anything specific this month to address either one? Does the new year truly begin for you on January 1, or is there some other month of the year that feels like a fresh start and new beginning?

This year I've begun to address the many pounds that have crept on over the last twenty years or so and have finally jumped on the high protein/low carb bandwagon.  My inspiration was a book called Always Hungry by David Ludwig, MD, PhD.  It's not as hard as I thought, but I'm only in the first week.  Time and the scale will tell.





4. Who's an athlete you admire or respect and why?

I'm not a big sports fan, but I admired the late Arthur Ashe.




5. Do you like cream in your coffee? Whipped cream on your pumpkin pie? Cream cheese on a bagel? Sour cream on a baked potato? Cream of wheat for breakfast? Have you ever had a scone with clotted cream? Of all the creamy foods mentioned, which one sounds most appealing to you right this very minute?

A great benefit of my new eating regimen described above is that cream is actually allowed.  Unfortunately, the bagel, baked potato, and the scone aren't.  However, I could totally get behind some unsweetened whipped cream on my berries for dessert.




6. Where were you last kept waiting for 'hours on end'? Or for what felt like hours on end? How well did you cope?

I had to wait a good hour for maybe ten minutes of actual contact with the orthopedist last week.  Most of it was in the exam room.  I think I'd rather wait in the waiting room, because being confined in a small windowless room is no fun.  Unfortunately, I didn't bring enough reading material.



7. Believe it or not, when next week's Hodgepodge rolls around it will be February. Huh?!? Bid adieu here to January in seven words or less.

See ya next year!



8.  Insert your own random thought here.

I'm going to keep my random thoughts about politics to myself (aren't y'all glad?).  What I will say is that having taught myself magic loop knitting from a YouTube video this afternoon, I'm feeling pretty pleased with myself.  

Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Hat for My Little Frozen Fan

I made this hat and one just like it for my younger granddaughter from a kit which supplied the yarn and the cute little snowflake topper.  The cold never bothered her anyway; it will bother her even less now.

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Wednesday Hodgepodge January 13, 2016

1. Share one thing that really makes your day.

Getting a text with a picture of my granddaughters really makes my day!  They are the cutest girls ever--and I'm not in the least biased.




2. Lots of these kinds of lists out there, but one found here says the fifteen most colorful places on earth are:

Vernazza, Cinque Terre, Italy~Burano, Italy~Havana, Cuba~Rio de Janiero, Brazil~Chefchaouen, Morocco~Balat, Istanbul, Turkey~Menton, France~Jodhpur, India~La Baca, Buenos Aires, Argentina~Guanajuato, Mexico~Capetown, South Africa~Valparaiso, Chile~Wroclaw, Poland~San Francisco, California~and Pelourhino, Salvador, Brazil.  

Of those listed which would you most like to see up close and in person? Of all the places you've seen or traveled in your own life, what would you say was one of the most colorful?

I think I'd like to see Havana before it gets completely commercialized.  I've been to San Francisco, and while I think it's a very colorful place, I'm surprised at the places that aren't on this list.  If I were compiling a list I would add Santa Fe, NM and Victoria, BC to the list.



3."Everything you want is on the other side of fear." Jack Canfield  In general, would you agree or disagree with that statement? Why?

I'd have to agree with this statement.  Everything in life I've done that matters most--marriage, parenting, ordination--has involved conquering fear.  Someone wrote a book years ago with a title that was something like Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway.  Maybe I'll get around to finding it and reading it one of these days!





4. Imagine you're stranded on a desert island and dessert appears...what do you hope it is? Do you ever struggle to remember which spelling is desert and which is dessert?

I certainly hope it's bread pudding, my current favorite dessert.  The difference is spelling between desert and dessert is no problem for me, but I'm a bit of a nerd :)




5. What song almost always makes you cry?

Once in Royal David's City makes me cry every time I hear it or sing it.  I love it's description of the Incarnation.



6. January is National Soup Month.  Everything from soup to nuts, in the soup, thick as pea soup, souped up...which saying most recently applies to your life in some way? Explain.

I LOVE soup--for me it's the ultimate comfort food.  And I have spent many hours over the years volunteering in soup kitchens, first as a meal preparer and server and later as a chaplain.



7. Write a two word note to your younger self. What does it say?

The note says "Don't worry," not because there isn't anything to worry about, but because much of the worrying I've done during my life was completely unnecessary.



8. Insert your own random thought here.

Lately I've been thinking about the next decades of my life.  Of course I don't know how many are left (I'm 61) and for how many of them I'll enjoy full vigor.  My mother began her ten-year decline in her mid 70s, which for me is not all that far away.